#1399 - Situation Assessment

Currently, the economic difficulties faced by East Africa are very similar to those of the Far Eastern Empire in my previous life. In high-end industries and technology, the dominant countries remain traditional European and American industrial powers such as Britain, France, Germany, and the United States.

East Africa is in an awkward position, neither here nor there. Although East Africa has made rapid progress in recent years through relatively rational industrial and scientific research layouts.

However, relative to the current economic volume of East Africa, its medium and high-end industries are still relatively weak.

The United States and Germany faced similar situations to East Africa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (generally referring to the first two decades of the 20th century), but they had deep accumulations and could achieve significant breakthroughs. Before World War I, the two countries basically achieved overtaking Britain and France in terms of industry and technology.

Since its independence, the United States has almost never had bad luck. Its development can be described as smooth sailing. Its basic conditions, such as geography, climate, resources, and agricultural development foundation, can be described as the "Land of the Chosen" in my previous life.

In Ernst's view, unless Europe can be integrated into one country, objectively speaking, there is no place in the world with better conditions for the industrial age than the United States.

As for East Africa, although it has become the world's largest economy through half a century of effort, the price it has paid is much greater than that of the United States.

For example, in the steel industry, the United States has abundant reserves of both coal and iron ore, and the distribution of these two resources is relatively concentrated. Moreover, with the support of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River shipping, it is simply feeding the Americans.

On the other hand, East Africa's early coal and iron ore resources were not particularly prominent. Only in the southern part of the colony, near the Lake Malawi area, were there sufficient coal resources for early industrial development, and the distribution of iron ore was also relatively limited.

Even later, East Africa finally made up for its resource shortcomings through endless wars and territorial expansion, but the development cost of East Africa's steel industry was still higher than that of the United States. Especially before acquiring South Africa, the region with the most concentrated mineral resources in Africa, many steel companies in East Africa were built by relying on land transportation construction.

In other words, in the early stage of East Africa's industrial development, the development of the steel industry was based on railway transportation.

Railway construction is obviously far less convenient than the excellent shipping of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River, and the construction, operation, and maintenance costs are also higher.

In the early stage of industrialization, the advantages of the coal-iron complex were significant, and the premise of the coal-iron complex was proximity to both iron ore and coal mines, so as to develop the steel industry.

The United Kingdom, the Ruhr area in Germany, and the Great Lakes industrial area in the United States are all typical examples, while the opposite example is France. French industry gradually fell behind due to a lack of sufficient coal.

East Africa only had the conditions to build a coal-iron complex after acquiring South Africa and Mozambique. For example, the Tete industrial area is a region with relatively abundant and concentrated coal and steel resources.

In addition to the availability, reserves, and distribution of resources, the transportation cost in East Africa is obviously only higher than that of the United States. The United States has a vast central plain, and the construction cost of railways and highways can be said to be one of the lowest in the world.

East Africa has more complex terrain, with plateaus, basins, mountains, and plains intertwined, and many canyons, which increases the difficulty of transportation construction in East Africa.

However, East Africa's terrain is not too bad, and can only be said to be at a moderate level. Because it is mainly plateaus, East Africa is generally relatively flat, but the cost of transportation construction is definitely higher than that of the United States and Europe, which is beyond doubt.

The solution for East Africa to solve this relatively unfavorable factor is also very simple, that is, to carry out large-scale transportation infrastructure construction for half a century.

The main difficulties of transportation infrastructure construction are concentrated in the early stage. Once the construction is completed, it will be a very profitable business. East Africa's sacrifice is mainly millions of black laborers. From the last century to the beginning of this century, blacks were just a string of numbers or consumables to the East African government.

Solving the infrastructure problems such as transportation is the foundation for the leapfrog development of East African industry at the beginning of this century.

However, the cost of industrial development in East Africa before this was obviously much higher than that of Europe and the United States.

Ernst said to Friedrich: "Although we East Africans are seen as nouveau riche by other countries in the world, especially European and American countries, in fact, they have not seen how much effort we have put in for the development of East Africa."

"Nearly ten million people have lost their lives for the construction of East Africa. It is precisely because of the sacrifice of these ten million black laborers that we have built the world's largest agricultural scale, the world's largest power system, the world's third largest transportation network, the world's fourth largest water conservancy system, etc., thereby laying a solid foundation for the world's largest industrial country."

In the field of agriculture, East Africa has the largest arable land area in the world. After all, East Africa itself is a populous country, and the consumption of agriculture is greater than that of the United States, so the growth of arable land in East Africa has always been relatively fast.

In terms of the power system, East Africa completely laid out early and gave full play to the advantages of concentrating efforts to do great things, and forcibly built East Africa into the most popular and developed region in the world.

In terms of transportation, East Africa has the world's third largest railway network, second only to North America and Europe. In terms of highways, the length of highway construction in East Africa is second only to Europe, and the length of hardened roads ranks first in the world. It is also the world's largest automobile producer. Finally, in terms of shipping, East Africa's shipping development is also second only to Europe and the United States.

In terms of water conservancy system, East Africa can only rank fourth in the world, and the regions before East Africa are Europe, the United States, and the Far Eastern Empire.

The former two are easier to understand. After all, European and American industry developed early, and Europe itself has a more developed water conservancy system and the advantage of historical accumulation, while the United States also has its geographical advantages and low water conservancy construction costs.

As for why the Far Eastern Empire can rank before East Africa, this is because of the long-term historical heritage of the Far Eastern Empire and the rich legacy left behind. The historical data in the field of water conservancy construction in the history of the Far Eastern Empire is deeper than the history of most countries.

Of course, there is also a common reason why these three regions can rank before East Africa, that is, their natural conditions are much better than those of East Africa.

The Yangtze River, the Pearl River, the Huai River…

The Rhine, the Danube, the Volga…

The Mississippi River…

The river conditions in the above three regions are enough to make East Africa envious, and their average regional precipitation is generally higher than that of East Africa, which is also more stable relative to East Africa.

This also provides favorable natural basic conditions for their water conservancy facility construction. After all, the prerequisite for water conservancy construction is "water". Without water, water conservancy is impossible.

Of course, if you change the standard, East Africa's water conservancy construction should actually rank second in the world, only a little worse than Europe, and on par with the United States. For example, from the perspective of efficiency, East Africa's water conservancy system ranks second in the world.

Although the scale of water conservancy construction in the Far Eastern Empire has experienced long-term historical accumulation, and even has living fossils such as the Dujiangyan Irrigation System that has been operating for thousands of years, this cannot change the reality that the water conservancy system in the Far Eastern Empire is now large but useless.

After all, the water conservancy system requires constant maintenance, and the Far East Empire is now in a "time of turmoil," with the water conservancy system also affected, and many water conservancy facilities are in a state of disrepair.

Not to mention, the current technological level of the Far East Empire is relatively low. Even if it stabilizes, it will be difficult to catch up with other industrial powers in a short period.

Ernst said, "Over the past few decades, your grandfather and I have put in a lot of effort for this country to achieve today's achievements and build East Africa into a relatively strong country."

In this way, after Friedrich becomes the helm of the empire, it will be difficult to make achievements, and people will naturally compare him with Ernst.

Of course, in addition to this reason, Ernst also has other considerations.

"These projects, in addition to being your achievements in the future, are also bargaining chips that I have prepared for you because I feel that the world economy may have a major problem."

"Don't look at the fact that the world economy is showing signs of recovery, and it is very likely that the world economy will be unprecedentedly prosperous in the next period of time, but I predict that after the next great prosperity, the world economy is also very likely to decline."

"This will trigger an unprecedented global economic crisis. After all, we all know very well that the increase in industrial production capacity in the whole world must correspond to a reasonable market size, and the world market itself is fixed, at least relative to the blindly increased industrial production capacity."

"However, in the next few years, the industry of various countries in the world will usher in a period of outbreak. Countries such as Britain, France, Germany, the United States, Austria, Russia, the Far East Empire and Japan will launch a military competition in the field of industrial development."

Developing industry is the only way out for most countries, but this also means that the industrial development of the whole world will become more competitive in the next few years.

If you don't choose to follow up, then lagging behind in industry means lagging behind in national strength, and you may become the fish on someone else's table in the next conflict.

Therefore, an economic crisis and World War II are bound to happen, and Ernst estimates that it is likely to be more tragic and larger in scale than in his previous life.

Of course, this result is also promoted to a certain extent because of the existence of East Africa established by Ernst. Without the existence of East Africa, that war would not have ended so "hastily."

This also means that next time, the contradictions in Europe will be more acute, the scale of the war will be larger, the scope will be wider, and the intensity will be stronger.

Ernst is not repelled by the emergence of this result. After all, judging from the current situation, East Africa is in an invincible position. In the next war, East Africa will definitely not choose to stand by as it did in World War I, but will make a final decision and become one of the leaders and builders of the new international order.

"The development of industry will naturally drive the development of national defense and military fields in various countries, and you have also seen that the war during the World War was so tragic that it can be said to be unprecedented. If another World War occurs, it will also mean a more tragic situation."

"And our advantage in East Africa is obvious, that is, like the United States, we are far away from Europe, this place of right and wrong. After the outbreak of the European war again, East Africa is unlikely to be affected in a short period of time."

"But if this war really happens, we will probably not choose to sit idly by like the previous World War, but let East Africa sit in the position it should have been in."

Friedrich listened to Ernst's prediction, but a surge of shock was set off in his heart. After all, past experience has proved that his father has always been very accurate in the general trend of world development.

He asked calmly, "Father, do you mean that there will be a Second World War? When might it happen?"

Ernst said, "The outbreak of a world war is essentially the accumulation of contradictions between countries exceeding the threshold, and ultimately having to transfer and alleviate the destructive power of the outbreak of contradictions through war."

"And when will the contradictions completely erupt? In international politics, it is naturally when the world economy is sluggish, just like the last World War. Before that, the world economic development was in a bottleneck, and countries such as Russia had to start a war."

To be honest, the culprit of World War I was Russia. There is no need to doubt this at all, because only Russia's economy had reached the brink of collapse. If the Tsarist Russian government did not launch a war, then Russia itself would explode.

Although other countries have more or less problems, they are not fatal to their own regimes and rule. They launched wars more because of greed.

The typical example is Germany. The rapid development of Germany's economy, industry, military and other fields in the last century and the beginning of this century has rapidly expanded Germany's ambitions. Therefore, before World War I, German senior officials such as Wilhelm II not only had no awe of war, but also wanted to achieve the great cause of dominating Europe through war.

Of course, from the perspective of senior German officials, this is actually not a big problem, but the funny thing is that Germany, the country that supported the war, hastily started the war without making adequate preparations for the war. Not to mention anything else, if Germany had made sufficient mobilization and material reserves at the beginning of the war, it would not have fallen into a state of depression in the middle and late stages of the Western Front.

After all, Germany's offensive in the early stage was very rapid, and it was very close to Paris. If it could go all out, France would probably be gone.

Ernst said, "The next time the world economic crisis breaks out, it may be the most tense and critical time in the global situation. This is common sense. Of course, as long as we are prepared, we can remain unshaken no matter how the world situation develops."

"At present, don't be confused by the development of the world economic situation, but should take the opportunity to unswervingly make up for the shortcomings of the empire, so that East Africa can better cope with future crises, or even wars."

In short, Ernst does not believe in the set of Western economists now. East Africa must not only intervene and adjust its own economic development before the outbreak of the future economic crisis, but also do some work in advance before the outbreak of the economic crisis, instead of acting as the so-called economic "night watchman" like the US government.